Anchorage Planning Office overrides community vision on Area Plan

By Soren Wuerth

TNews Editor

Anchorage's planning department is recommending changes to Girdwood's Comprehensive Plan that vastly conflict with community priorities and, in some cases, favor support for private interests, according to a letter published last week.

Notable among 11 changes proposed by the agency is the designation of land in the upper valley from "open space" to "mixed use", a designation sought by Alyeska Resort which has said it needs the land for its future development plans.

Reaction was swift when a notice was posted Sunday on Girdwood's Facebook page.

"We propose a plan that takes years of work [only] to be completely ignored because Anchorage knows what's better. They tax us, they regulate us, and then [we] have no representation and are ignored," one commenter, "Brice Jon", posted.

Some of the planning department's proposed changes are described as "very significant" by the group Imagine!Girdwood, which has overseen a multi-year planning process to update the almost 30-year-old Girdwood Area Plan, a process that has involved dozens of public meetings, more than 900 people, and received over 400 comments.

Girdwood's Comprehensive Plan heads to Anchorage for approval by the Planning and Zoning Commission Monday, then, later this summer, by the Anchorage Assembly. Girdwood's vision, as laid out in the plan, is already facing major revisions by city planning officials. (Photo by Soren Wuerth)

One change in the plan recommended by the department would allow Alyeska Resort to build a subdivision in nearly 100 acres of public, wild rainforest popular for its nordic ski trails.

Citing an Anchorage-wide "shortage of land for development", portions of Girdwood's upper valley should not be designated as "open space", according to the planning department's letter. 

The area, east of Glacier Creek, is designated as "open space" in Girdwood's plan and has had widespread endorsement in planning meetings and comments.

"It would be detrimental to the public interest and welfare of the community and inconsistent" with Anchorage's housing plan to designate open space to areas "most suitable to development," Planning Director Craig Lyon wrote last week.

A spokesperson for Pomeroy Lodging—the Canadian hotel company that owns the Resort—has said without income from developing the public land, which is currently managed by Anchorage's Heritage Land Bank, the company cannot finance other projects closer to its current hotel.

"Arguably, these are some of the most developable lands in Girdwood right now," Pomeroy's development manager, Willam Laurie told members of the planning commission during a hearing in early June in Anchorage. The planning commission adopted Pomeroy's plan despite its contradiction with the community's land use goals.

The letter by the planning office states that "open space" designations are "inconsistent" with the Comprehensive Plan's goals to "encourage a broad range of new housing...consistent with Girdwood's community character [and] natural character ..."

"HLB found 11 parcels most suitable for development in Girdwood and some of these 11 parcels have a land use designation of 'Open Space' in the draft Girdwood Comprehensive Plan," Lyon wrote. "It is not in the public interest and welfare of the community to have the most developable parcels in Girdwood designated 'Open Space'."

Other changes the planning office recommends are deleting "vegetative buffers" and "potential future park land" designations from the comprehensive plan, changing land near Virgin Creek from "Open Space" to "Low-Density Residential", and changing portions of Girdwood's South Townsite, an area near the Forest Fair park, from "Open Space" to "Mixed-use".

Meanwhile, the Heritage Land Bank, which owns 6,300 acres in Girdwood, won approval from the Anchorage Assembly to allow development of 60 acres for a so-called "Holtan Hills" subdivision west of Glacier Creek near Girdwood's school. Critics of that plan have said it will do little to solve Girdwood's housing demand and only exacerbate existing demands on infrastructure.

According to Imagine!Girdwood's website, "The [Planning and Zoning] Commission can accept some or all of the Planning [Department's] recommendations and/or substitute their own. The [P&Z Commission] recommendation goes to the full Assembly who can also make changes and will make the final adoption decision."

The Planning and Zoning Commission takes up Girdwood's Comprehensive Plan in a work session tomorrow, Monday, at 6:30 pm.